Top Secrets to Develop Gross Motor Skills

Have you ever watched you child to stumble as he is walking or running? Do not panic! This is only another period of his life in which you should be by his side in order to support him.

In addition, there are different things you can do with your child to help him improve his gross motor skills, which are abilities needed to control the large muscles of the body for sitting, crawling, walking, running, and the whole body movements.

Most of these abilities are acquired during the early childhood and infancy as part of a child motor development. As a child develops better control of the arms and legs, she begins to develop fine motor skills. They are able to grasp, touch, feed themselves, etc.

By the time they reach two years old, almost all children have developed gross motor skills such as standing up, walking and running, walking up stairs, etc. Lacking these skills, children might get some problems with fine motor skills required for academic achievement. This is the reason why it is important to help our children develop gross motor skills before they start their primary school years.

Approximately 15 percent of students attending primary schools have motor difficulties. The lowest 5 percent of the students diagnosed as having poor coordination have severe problems and 10 percent have moderate problems. There are different activities you can carry out with your preschool child to improve these skills:

For developing balance, it is recommendable to play with a large ball. Motivate your child to kick the ball by using both feet, one at a time. Ask your child to walk along a chalk line. Climbing steps stairs step ladders and walking on knees with hands in the air is another good option. You can also teach your child to play with ride on toys.

When working on body awareness, laterality knowing left and right sides of the body, and spatial orientation, play Simon says and ask you child to stand in front of, next to, behind, on top of, or under a given object. Tell your child to mimic all your movements.

Perform some actions as you sing songs. Roll body of tour child on a mat.

In order to strength major muscles co ordination, ask your child to gallop like a horse, to crawl to find hidden objects, and to climb over, up, down boxes, ladders, planks, logs, etc. Running around an obstacle course with hands on head/hips/behind back is another strategy you can use. Hogben J, 1981

Developing this kind of skills means getting your children exercising a lot, as a result they get some other health benefits like pure blood, good digestion and calm character.

Make sure your child has lots of time to run around, climb, play and do some work like gardening or helping with other chores. In case you live in a city, find a park, or any other suitable place where you can go and have fun involved in some physical exercise. Even in winter or cold weather, wear warm clothing, go out, develop your gross of you child motor skills, and enjoy the outdoors.